Wildlife Conservation Society

About Us

The Wildlife Conservation Society, founded in 1895, has the clear mission to save wildlife and wild places across the globe. Our story began in the early 1900s when we successfully helped the American bison recover on the Western Plains. Today, we protect many of the world’s iconic creatures here and abroad, including gorillas in the Congo, tigers in India, wolverines in the Yellowstone Rockies, and ocean giants in our world’s amazing seascapes.

Since our founding, we have forged the power of our global conservation work and the management of our five parks in New York City to create the world’s most comprehensive conservation organization. We currently manage about 500 conservation projects in more than 60 countries; and educate millions of visitors at our five living institutions in New York City on important issues affecting our planet. Our parks include: the Bronx Zoo, New York Aquarium, Central Park Zoo, Prospect Park Zoo, and Queens Zoo.

With a commitment to protect 50 percent of the world’s biodiversity, we address four of the biggest issues facing wildlife and wild places: climate change; natural resource exploitation; the connection between wildlife health and human health; and the sustainable development of human livelihoods. While taking on these issues, we work across 5.8 million square kilometers (3.6 million square miles), both land and sea, protecting 40 percent of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity and 55 percent of its marine biodiversity.

The WCS parks in New York City welcome 4 million visitors each year, and educate millions of schoolchildren on science and conservation issues.

Our history, dating back to ensuring the survival of the American bison, inspires our work each day. We hope our work in turn inspires millions to take action to protect the natural resources that are so important to all life on our fragile Earth.

WCS Trustees & Senior Management

Careers at WCS

From field science and conservation policy to non-profit management and park operations, career opportunities at WCS are as diverse as our work. Together, WCS’s nearly 4,000 staff members in New York City and around the world work to change attitudes toward nature and help people imagine wildlife and humans living in harmony.

WCS offers several programs to support wildlife conservation work across the world, providing graduate education opportunities for future conservationists working in their home countries; offering grants to other nonprofit conservation organizations, state wildlife agencies, and tribal governments; and providing guidance in training and capacity-building to the leaders of tomorrow.